


Love Me Tender

by scarsandstars



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Comfort, Disgustingly sweet, Domestic Fluff, Fluff, Fluff without Plot, M/M, Short & Sweet
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-12
Updated: 2018-12-12
Packaged: 2019-09-16 19:34:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,300
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16960203
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scarsandstars/pseuds/scarsandstars
Summary: "I'm disgusting," Keith complains as he noisily blows his nose, puts the tissue on his lap, and grabs another one out of the box to do it again. Louder and, yeah, a little grosser."Yeah, you kind of are," Shiro teases him.---Keith has a cold and who is better to take care of him than Shiro?





	Love Me Tender

**Author's Note:**

  * For [maginot](https://archiveofourown.org/users/maginot/gifts).



Keith is too stubborn to admit when he's sick, so Shiro knows it's bad when he agrees, in a very Keith-like way, to go to the doctor. His agreeing to go consists of him letting out a high-pitched whine under his breath and not putting up any kind of resistance when Shiro picks him up off the bed covered in tissues and hands him his own jacket, the warmest one he owns, and a pair of shoes.

Of course, Keith is so sick that when he tries to bend over and tie the shoes on, he gets dizzy and almost falls face-first onto the floor. So Shiro hands him a pair of slip-ons that had been discarded somewhere in the back of their closet, and helps him put them on. Keith zips up Shiro's jacket, laughably big on him, and leaves his arms hang to the sides.

"There," he whines. "I'm all set."

Shiro wraps a scarf around his neck and ignores Keith's deep, disapproving frown. He almost expects Keith to pull it off or tell him off, but all he does is glare at him from under the messy hair falling on his face and let out a groan.

Keith barely says a word as Shiro drives him to the doctor's office. He just crosses his arms for as long as he can, since he spends more than half the drive sneezing and blowing his nose and somehow starts to insist, again, that he is absolutely fine. Or "find," as he says it.

"Let's just see what the doctor says, baby." Shiro drives.

"I'm disgusting," Keith complains as he noisily blows his nose, puts the tissue on his lap, and grabs another one out of the box to do it again. Louder and, yeah, a little grosser.

"Yeah, you kind of are," Shiro teases him.

Keith turns to look at him with narrowed eyelids like he was threatening him in silence--he kind of is, Shiro supposes, because after a few seconds he pinches Shiro's thigh. As hard as his feeble, exhausted hand can do it, which, honestly, isn't all that much. 

"Hey!" Shiro exclaims, trying not to laugh too hard. 

Out of the corner of his eye, Shiro can see Keith glaring at the road in front of them like he was casting a curse upon it and every inhabitant of the town, a deep frown on his face and his arms tightly crossed, and it makes Shiro smile to himself the rest of the drive.

Back home from the office, Keith stomps in a weak and sickly way to their bedroom and unties the scarf before flopping facedown onto the bed. And he lets out a long whine, muffled by the mattress.

"My ass hurts," he mumbles as Shiro sits next to him on the bed.

"I know it does, baby."

Shiro rubs the spot where he got the antibiotic shot softly and playfully, and chuckles when Keith whines again.

"Do you want some tea?" Shiro offers, his voice soft, his fingers running gently through Keith's hair.

Keith groans against the mattress. Shiro takes it as a yes.

When he comes back to the room with a cup of tea in his hand, he finds Keith snuggled up into a ball. He didn't take off Shiro's jacket, not entirely, just kind of shrugged off a part of it to ball up under his head as a pillow that seems to be strangling the other side of his body, but he's sleeping and looking so comfortable that Shiro doesn't even question it. The sheets and covers are a mess around him, only covering certain parts of his body with soft, colorful fabric: a bit of his leg, a bit thrown over his waist, a bit hiding half of his face. Keith is surrounded by balled up tissues and he's snoring, rhythmic and soft. After stepping a little closer, Shiro can see that Keith is drooling over his jacket and his skin looks grey and a little pale. There's dark circles under his eyes, because he's been unable to sleep for two nights. The tip of his nose is red and the skin looks irritated from blowing it too much--Keith has very sensitive skin for a guy who's half fuzzy alien. At least Shiro is glad that Keith just has a regular flu and not some bizarre space illness like that time Coran had the "slipperies" and Shiro didn't get close to him or anything he touched for a couple of days.

Shiro sets the cup of tea on the bedside table and lies down in front of Keith, just watching the rise and fall of his chest and hearing his little snores. He brushes a strand of hair away from his clammy forehead--he can deal with this small amount of sweat and illness. Especially when it's his Keith.

Shiro's touch wakes him up. He frowns and blinks lazily a few times, and his eyes look huge and unfocused before they fall on Shiro's face. Keith gives him the softest, most pitiful little smile he's ever given him, and his voice is a little rough when he says, simply, "Hey."

"Hey, babe," Shiro whispers back and brushes the hair out of Keith's forehead again. "I got you your tea."

Keith's little smile widens. But only for a second, because he immediately starts to cough and sneeze about twelve times in quick succession, hurriedly and clumsily reaching for the box of tissues. Once he's done blowing his nose, Keith groans and whines again and only seems to realize the strange thing he did with Shiro's jacket then, and struggles to get it off his body like he was pissed off at every single thread of cotton in it. Shiro just watches him: he curses and groans and folds up the jacket into a messy ball before setting it down as a pillow again, and then rests his head on top of it, still looking equal parts pissed off and miserable. And though he's lying down, he still crosses his arms.

The warmth in Shiro's chest spreads through him and colors the tips of his ears a soft red. Keith is annoyed and grumpy and hasn't stopped complaining and groaning and whining in over 48 hours but Shiro had never loved him so much. He'd never been more sure that this is where he wants to spend the rest of his days. Right here, in this place with Keith's grumpy face and his strange sleeping habits and the stubbornness that also robbed Shiro of two nights of sleep. This is where he belongs. Keith is his home.

"You should rest, babe," Shiro whispers and leans in to press a kiss to Keith's forehead. It makes him try to push Shiro away.

"Don't kiss me, Shiro, I'm gross right now," he says.

"You sure are," Shiro replies, softly, and gives him a little smile. 

Keith looks up at him with that frown still on his face, but it softens almost immediately. Shiro knows Keith is quite ill, but he chooses to take credit for the light blush that spreads across his face.

Keith knows what Shiro meant. He always does. It's why he shifts on the bed and squeezes his arms around Shiro's waist and pulls him close, burying his clammy, feverish face into the crook of his neck. He snuggles into it--their bodies fit close together like pieces of a puzzle, and Shiro strokes Keith's hair.

"You're gross," Keith mumbles against Shiro's skin, squeezing himself even closer to him.

Shiro smiles. He kisses the top of his head, and he swears he can hear Keith purring as he drifts off to sleep again, safe in his arms. 

He'll take that over some strange alien illness any day, though.

**Author's Note:**

> thanks for reading! you can find me on twitter @gothshirogane!


End file.
